Letters to the editor Thursday: Appalled by minister's take on Trump

Wednesday

May 15, 2019 at 7:52 PMMay 16, 2019 at 8:19 AM

Appalled by minister's take on Trump

The religiously self-righteous screed polluting the May 13 Opinion page was shameful.

While not dissecting the delusion of dystopia the letter writer, a minister, professes that America suffers from, I will observe that there is no spiritual guidance, salvation, or even sanctuary in his words. There is anger and retribution. Perhaps he does not speak for a Christian church.

With forgiveness, love and grace we are all able, as children of God, to live in a world where we work the land provided and we sustain glorifying relationships with our Creator's other children. It is our economic, moral and community imperative to elevate our fellow humans. This letter denigrates and ridicules those he condemns.

The letter writer seems to have forgotten his teachings. Now he alone is permitted to pass judgement and retribution upon those he feels that God did not create correctly, or whose behavior he does not love, accept or minister to? What creator empowered him to denigrate and to casts aspersions.

I am more Christian than any paid preacher I know. I hope that if the Savannah Morning News is going to present the position of a holy man as an opinion, that another holy man is allowed to counter with a calling to honor the teachings of our Creator and not those of a misanthropic human.

R. Scott Belford, Sunbury

Dual loyalty argument harkens back to 1860s

The letter published April 13 explaining why Jewish Americans should not feel awkward about harboring dual loyalty toward the United States and Israel reminded me of the dilemma faced by our Confederate forefathers 160 years ago.

The descendants of patriots who won American independence from Great Britain and who forged the Constitution, they did not enter upon secession lightly. In their view, the federal government had long before overstepped its constitutional bounds by the imposition of oppressive tariffs that benefited northern industry at the expense of southern farmers. The tyrannical depredations of Abraham Lincoln and his threatened invasion of the South after the secession of seven states spurred the secession of the five more states.

One is reminded of Robert E. Lee's remark after being offered command of the Union armies that he would gladly free all his slaves if he thought it preserve the union, then reflected, "but how can I turn my sword against Virginia?"

In these times when the federal government has become something that would be unrecognizable to the Founding Fathers, we Americans of every region must ask ourselves where our loyalties lie. Do we owe allegiance to a national government that has long overstepped its constitutional bounds, that has become destructive of the ends for which it was established?

Article 5 of the Constitution provides for a convention of states for proposing amendments whenever two-thirds of the states approve this measure. Perhaps this is the remedy for preserving our beloved American nation. But until the injuries perpetrated against our nation and its Constitution by unconscionable, self-serving politicians are redressed, the federal government has a dubious expectation of loyalty and obedience from the people of the sovereign states.

Let us never forget that the Constitution was a contract among the states that carefully enumerated the powers the federal government could exercise, and strictly forbade those it could not. The federal government broke the contract a long time ago. It is time for a change. In this season when we celebrate our Confederate forefathers, let us ponder just how we should bring about this change.

Jeffrey Webster, Statesboro

Medical students belong in operating room

What a fascinating subject group: hospital consent forms, female patients, and medical students. Since I’m only a man I will never know the practice of medicine on women nor of the practice of gynecologic surgery, but I have signed a lot of consent forms and seen a lot of medical students.

Since Thanksgiving Day of 2018 when I started heavy internal bleeding, and I went in for very intimate and life saving surgical procedures, the medical students assisted! The surgical staff and students were always careful to introduce themselves and ask my permission to have the med students observe during the procedure. My answer is always the same, “sure.”

We in America are fortunate to have the world’s best medical care, readily available, for most any illness or treatment, and medical professionals -- including student doctors -- at our training hospitals. I had a group of med students from India one time, who, maybe through my operation’s experience, can go back and uplift medical care in their country.

Ask yourself the question: How are future doctors and nurses to be trained without intimate contact with patients? It can’t be done having only textbooks and training videos. I welcome them in the operating room with me. I cheer them on.

I learned another thing with my series of heart surgeries and GI tract work I recently experienced, is, you leave your intimacy at the door of the operating room. Talk to your operating room nurses and staff before anesthesia takes hold, reassure them. They have a sense of humor. They will not hurt you.

Medicine’s a tough profession, and they are busy professionals just like you and me. Set them at ease, it will be to your benefit in the end. But then, I’m just a man.

Michael Rea, Savannah

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